The Month that Everything was Tested
by DramaLexy
Summary: The sequel to my story "The Year that Everything Changed." It's set three years after that fic ended. COMPLETE
1. Chapter One

TITLE: The Month that Everything was Tested

AUTHOR: DramaLexy

SUMMARY: The sequel to my story "The Year that Everything Changed." It's set three years after that fic ended. I'll let the rest be a surprise. :-)

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Okay, so this is what giving me good reviews will get you - faster writing :-) Thanks to all those who took the time to leave me a note. I'm hoping this lives up to the first story. And FYI, there will probably be a third installment at some point as well.

* * *

Olivia looked up from the leftover food she was putting away when she heard a distinct THUD somewhere within her house. A few seconds later, the noise came again, and this time, after a moment's pause, it was followed by the sound of a child wailing. 

"What happened?" she called up the stairs as she came out of the kitchen. Elliot came down a moment later, holding their son, Ben, who was the source of the wailing.

"I got a boo-boo!" the little boy whimpered as he displayed his arm for his mother.

"I heard," she told him with a sympathetic smile.

"Long-jump competition using beds for springboards," Elliot explained. Olivia rolled her eyes as she led the way to the hall bathroom.

"Were you officiating?"

"No, I am innocent for once."

"For once."

"He okay?" Elliot turned at the sound of his other son's voice.

"Yeah, Rick, he'll live." The twelve-year-old had finally outgrown his childhood nickname a year or so earlier. His twin sister had later revealed that the school bully had given him some incentive – 'Dickie' had been shortened to a rather nasty and taunting 'Dick' on the playground.

"I told him he couldn't really fly."

"Fly?" Olivia asked.

"Like Michael," Ben told her. She and Elliot both looked to Rick for an explanation.

"Me and Lizzie are reading Peter Pan for school. We figured we'd read it together to save time, and Ben was listening, too."

"Wendy, John, and Michael," Elliot realized. "Got it."

"We fly to Neva-land," Ben told his mother as she set him down on the counter by the sink.

"You're not flying anywhere without a pilot's license," she replied, inspecting his arm. "Other than a good rug-burn, I think you're okay."

"Band-aid?" he asked.

"Ah, yes. Magic Spiderman band-aids fix everything."

"Do me a favor?" Elliot asked Rick. "Find something to do that doesn't run the risk of you breaking your furniture or your brother." He rolled his eyes.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. He flew pretty far across the room, though, for being so small."

"I didn't need to hear that," Olivia told her stepson. Both boys grinned.

"Come on, sport," Rick said to his brother. Newly outfitted with a band-aid, Ben hurried after his brother back up the stairs.

"Bedtime in fifteen minutes, Ben," Olivia called after him. "Rick, you and Lizzie can come down here if you want to keep reading together."

"And when's your bedtime?" Elliot teasingly asked her once the boys were out of earshot.

"After we have four children soundly asleep," she replied. "And only if you behave yourself."

"Yes, ma'am."

* * *

There were some weekends where the three older kids were split between their mother's house and their father's house, depending on who was doing what when and with whom. That weekend, however, everyone was at home. When Elliot came back into the house after taking a morning run, he found the rest of his family in the kitchen making breakfast together. Olivia and Lizzie were having fun making funny-shaped pancakes, Kathleen was making eggs, Rick was making bacon, and even Ben was helping out by folding napkins for the table. He'd folded about four times as many as they needed, but he was still contributing. And Elliot couldn't think of a better sight to come home to. 

"Have we worked out who's going to be where this week?" Elliot asked as they all sat around the table.

"We're going to Mom's tomorrow," Kathleen told him.

"Cell phone," Elliot reminded his daughter as he noticed the device in her hand. She rolled her eyes, but shut it off.

"I'll be back Wednesday," she finished.

"Me, too," Rick added.

"I'll be back Thursday," Lizzie told him. "I've got dance rehearsal, and Mom wants to come." Elliot nodded.

"Well, that's three," he said. "How about you?" he asked Ben, turning to the little boy. "Any big plans?" He shook his head.

"Don't break my PS2 while I'm gone," Rick warned his brother. Ben loved getting into everybody's stuff, and it was even easier for him with Rick's things since they shared a room.

"An almost-empty house," Elliot commented to Olivia once the kids had started cleaning up. "What shall we do with ourselves?"

"Probably not as much of what you're thinking as you're thinking. You're on-call."

* * *

They did enjoy the three days of quiet – other than Ben. The little boy liked the rare opportunities to be the only child in the house. He got his parents' undivided attention. 

"Look at me, Mama," Olivia heard him say on Monday night as she and Elliot were trying to sort through the load of clothes he'd just removed from the dryer. Ben was standing on the bottom step of the stairs, and before she could stop him, he leaned forward and did a somersault off of it. Everyone heard the noise when he banged his head, however the little boy was giggling when he sat up.

"Owie," he said as he rubbed the spot.

"Owie is right," Elliot told him. "Come here." Ben ran over. He made sure his youngest hadn't really hurt himself (although he knew there would have been alligator tears if he had) and then turned him around. "Now, which one of your siblings put that idea in your head?" Ben smiled innocently.

"Had to have been Lizzie," Olivia told him. "Practicing her dance stuff."

"I dance, too, Daddy," Ben told him before proceeding to raise his arms over his head and walk on his tiptoes across the room. Elliot shook his head with a laugh.

"Men don't dance," he told the little boy.

"Oh really?" Olivia asked him. "Then who exactly has been my dance partner for the past few years?" Elliot sniffed.

"That's different."

"Mmm-hmm. Com'ere, Ben," she said. "You can dance with Mommy." She picked him up and waltzed around the room with him. The little boy was laughing his head off.

"No music, Mama," he told her.

"That's never stopped her before," Elliot told him. Olivia stuck her tongue out at him.

"Where are you sleeping tonight, again?" she asked him.

* * *

Later that night, once Ben was sound asleep and Elliot and Olivia were getting ready for bed themselves, she went back to what had happened in the living room. 

"Would you have a problem if Ben decided he liked dancing?" she asked Elliot. He stuck his head out of the bathroom, toothbrush in hand.

"What?"

"It's a simple question, Elliot."

"No. Why?"

"You made a comment to him earlier that I'm hoping he wasn't paying attention to."

"When?"

"Downstairs. When you told him that guys don't dance."

"You know what I meant."

"Yes, I did, but I don't know if a three-year-old would have. El, he's got three sisters and a brother. Just about everything he does comes from imitating one of them. This week he's watching Lizzie practice for dance. Next week, he'll be annoying Rick to play video games. The week after, he might decide to do some face painting with Kathleen's makeup. You've gotta be okay with that."

"I am okay with that, just…the image of boys playing with trucks and girls playing with dolls is a hard one to give up, you know?"

"I know. Especially when he's supposed to be one of the macho, tough Stabler men." Elliot threw a wet washcloth at her.

"Seriously, Liv," he said as he came out of the bathroom and turned off the light behind him. "He can grow up into anything he wants and it would be okay with me." He leaned across the bed and kissed her. "I'm gonna go check on him before we go to bed. I'll be right back."

Ben was still asleep, alright, although he was upside down in bed. Elliot shook his head with a smile as he pulled his son from under his blankets and flipped him around. They'd had several mornings where Ben would wake up stuck underneath his blanket and start crying because he didn't know how to get out; he didn't need another one.

Out in the hall, he stopped to look at the pictures on the walls. There was one of Maureen and Kathleen dressed up for Easter service when the latter couldn't have been any older than Ben was now. Another of Lizzie and Rick that had been taken only a few weeks after the twins had been born. The picture of all five kids after Ben had been born, another one of all seven of them at Elliot and Olivia's wedding, Kathleen's senior photo, a picture from Maureen's college graduation…the list went on. Outside of Ben and Rick's room was a picture from the last Halloween. Ben had been dressed as a puppy – he'd had a fascination with Dalmatians at the time – and Rick had been inspired by one of his video games to dress up as a wrestler. He was striking a 'tough' pose for the camera, and Ben was, of course, imitating his brother. The younger of the two was still better described by 'adorable' than anything else, but it was a nice picture of them together. They had a happy family.

"He still sleeping?" Olivia asked as Elliot returned.

"Oh, yeah. Couldn't wake him with a herd of elephants."

"We probably ought to get some sleep, too. Just so you can say they woke you up when they call at 2AM with a case." Elliot grinned.

"Sleep? Who needs sleep?"

* * *

It turned out that the only night Elliot was awakened for work was Tuesday night. He wound up working late, too, so Olivia had dinner with Kathleen, Rick, and Ben once the older two got back home, and made sure everything was in order for the night by herself. 

Thursday night would have been a family dinner except Kathy wound up keeping Lizzie a little late, and Kathleen was off with her friends.

"Did Kathleen get here yet?" Elliot asked his wife as she cleaned up the kitchen after they ate. Olivia shook her head.

"She said she had a lot of work to get done for her project."

"Yeah, I just…I don't want one of her friends driving her home late at night. I don't trust them."

"You don't trust anyone driving with your kids in the car."

"That's not entirely true. I just don't trust anyone under the age of 25 driving with my kids in the car."

"Mmm. Well, if one of us is supposed to be picking up Lizzie tonight from her mom's, then we can get Kathleen, too."

"Yeah, now I've just got to get her to answer her stupid cell phone. Considering the fact that we can't pry that thing out of her hands with a crowbar when its time for dinner, she sure misses a lot of calls when she's out with her friends." Olivia laughed.

"When you were her age, did you want to have to deal with your parents?"

"What's that got to do with anything?"

* * *

Lizzie was waiting in the foyer of Kathy's house, dance bag and school stuff in hand, when Olivia showed up to pick her up. "You're a whole thirty seconds late," she told her stepmother. 

"Wonderful to see you, too," Olivia told her with a grin. Lizzie returned it.

"Just kidding. Dad's the one who's always late."

"Yeah, well he's trying to beat your brother at whatever video game he's gotten now."

"NHL All Stars," Kathy supplied.

"Mom got it for him," Lizzie explained. The two women shared a look.

"Thanks," Olivia said after a moment. "I think Elliot had been talking about getting it. He goes through them so fast." Kathy gave her a half-nod. They weren't friends, but they were civil. And civility usually was dependent upon them interacting as little as possible. And the kids knew it.

"Bye, Mom," Lizzie told her before the awkward silence could stretch out.

"Bye, sweetie. You looked great today."

"Thanks. I'll let you know when my recital is."

"Okay."

"We gotta go pick up Kathleen," Olivia told Lizzie as they headed out to her car.

"Where?"

"In the city. She gave me the address. It shouldn't take too long."

* * *

By the time they got to the neighborhood where the address was, Olivia wasn't too thrilled with the area. She knew that if Elliot was picking up his daughter, Kathleen would never hear the end of it. 

The teen was outside with a couple friends when Olivia drove up and said good-bye before jumping in the car. "I thought your dad said you were working on a project with Megan and Lucy."

"I was," Kathleen told her. "And a couple other people like Kyle and Aaron. We were at Aaron's place."

"Has your dad met either of them?"

"No."

"Or your mom?"

"No."

"I think it might be a good idea to have future meetings at houses where one of them has met the people. Especially if there are boys involved."

"We weren't doing anything, Olivia. And I'm not Lizzie; I'm eighteen."

"I understand that, but we both know that your dad would have had a fit if he came to pick you up tonight, wouldn't he?" Kathleen had to agree.

"Are you going to say anything to him?"

"I don't know. I don't keep secrets from him."

"I know just…don't give him all the details, kay?"

* * *

TBC... 

How bad is it so far?


	2. Chapter Two

"Morning," Fin told Olivia as she sat down across from him in the squad room the next day.

"Yeah," she replied.

"You sound like you're having a great day so far." She sighed as she booted up her computer.

"Sometimes being the wicked stepmother sucks."

"Wicked stepmother? What happened?"

"Nothing. It's just…either I go against Kathleen's trust or Elliot's, and I haven't decided which yet." Fin shrugged, picking up a file.

"I recommend c) none of the above."

"I wish."

Cragen came out of his office, and taped up a photo on the dry erase board that was in the middle of the room. The senior photo of a pretty brunette high schooler smiled hauntingly at all of them.

"We've got a new case," he announced.

* * *

Munch, the great conspiracy theorist and hypochondriac, was out sick with whatever the latest disease was to hit the tabloids, so Elliot was tagging along with Fin and Olivia. As the three of them drove to the scene of their latest victim's rape and death – the M.E. was calling it an accidental drug overdose, not a homicide – Olivia went over the case file and shared the details with her partners. Time of death was somewhere between ten o'clock the previous evening and two that morning. According to the cops that had found the body, the area was an often-used location for parties. 

When the car stopped, Olivia instantly recognized the neighborhood, even in the daytime. And Elliot recognized the look on her face. "What?" he asked.

"I've been here before." He frowned.

"Really? When, another case?"

"No, last night. I picked up Kathleen down the street." Fin decided to walk ahead of them before he got caught in the crossfire.

"What the hell was she doing over here?!?"

"This is where one of her friends lived that she was working with."

"And you forgot to mention this?"

"No. I was trying to find the right time or way to tell you." Elliot sighed.

"This wasn't it."

* * *

Their vic had been at a party, there was evidence of that all over the abandoned row house where her body had been found. Broken bottles, cups, and cigarette butts were littering the floor. Narcotics made regular sweeps of the area, and had found the door wide open that morning. The girl's parents were out of town and wouldn't be back until that evening, so the detectives paid a visit to her high school – Kathleen's school – in the meantime to try and figure out who had been on the guest list. 

"What exactly happened last night?" Elliot asked Olivia as they waited in a conference room for the principal to retrieve one of the victim's friends for questioning.

"I picked up Kathleen at the address she gave me. I wasn't comfortable with the area and I told her about it. She said she was at…Aaron's house instead of one of her girlfriends."

"Aaron? Who the hell is Aaron?"

"I don't know; one of the boys in her class. I told her that she should stick to friend's houses where you or her mom knows the friend and she said okay."

"Why didn't you say anything to me?"

"Because until this morning, I didn't think that it was a big deal. Just a 'lesson learned' kind of thing."

"What books did she have with her?" Olivia frowned.

"What?"

"She told me that she was working on a history project, and I want to know if my kid was lying to me. What did she have with her?"

"Now that I think about it…I don't think she had any books. But maybe someone else from the group brought theirs, like the person whose house they were at. Or maybe they didn't need them. I don't know, Elliot."

He nodded. "I'm not a fan of maybe."

* * *

"Kathleen!" Elliot yelled as he and Olivia came home once they finally got off of work. Lizzie came out of the kitchen. 

"She's upstairs, in her room, on the phone with somebody," she told them. "Rick's doing homework, and Ben's watching a video." At the mention of his name, Ben poked his head up over the back of the couch.

"Hi!" Elliot smiled at his son.

"Hey, buddy."

"I made dinner," Lizzie continued. "I just gotta take it out of the oven; I was keeping it warm until you came." Elliot hugged his daughter.

"Have I told you lately how wonderful you are? Leave it in the oven, though, okay? I have to talk to your sister." Lizzie nodded.

"You want backup?" Olivia asked. Elliot shook his head.

* * *

Kathleen looked up when she heard a knock on her door. "I'm on the phone," she called after covering the receiver with her hand. However, the door opened a moment later. "Dad!" 

"Hang up," he told her.

"I gotta go," she told her friend. "Yeah, I know. I'll talk to you later. Do you mind?" she asked her father, sitting up halfway on her bed.

"How'd your project go yesterday?"

"Fine."

"Who's in this group again?"

"Megan and Lucy…and some other people."

"Whose house did I drop you off at? Megan's?"

"Yeah. And then her parents took me to one of the other people's houses."

"Her parents did?"

"Yeah."

"I thought you said they weren't going to be home?"

"W-well they were." Elliot nodded, leaning against her doorframe.

"Okay, we're going to start this conversation over again, and keep in mind the fact that I already know the correct answers to all of my questions. How'd your project go?" Kathleen sighed.

"What did she tell you?"

"It doesn't matter what Olivia told me, Kathleen. What matters is what you're about to tell me. You can either flat out lie to me, try another version of your half-truth story you've already been telling, or you could actually tell me the real story."

"We weren't doing anything."

"You hear anything? Like a party down the street maybe?"

"N-no."

"That's funny, 'cause we had a vic down there this morning. And she goes to your school." Kathleen frowned.

"Who?"

"Ashley Meadowland. Ring a bell?"

"We have a class together."

"And you know what happened to her for her case to end up on my desk, don't you?" Kathleen nodded. "Were you at that party?" There was a pause.

"I didn't do anything, Dad."

"That wasn't what I asked!" She didn't answer. "You're grounded." Kathleen shot up off her bed, livid.

"I'm eighteen; you can't ground me!" Elliot raised an eyebrow.

"Wanna bet?"

"Fine, then I'll go stay with Mom."

"You think your mother would be any more thrilled with your behavior than I am?"

"She'd trust my word."

"I do trust your word. I haven't searched your room yet, have I?"

"You wouldn't do that."

"You give me a reason to stop trusting you, Kathleen, and yeah, I would. I'm not going to get a call from the morgue asking me to come identify my daughter's body. I will do anything to keep that from happening whether you like it or not." She just glared at him.

"I want to go stay with Mom."

"Fine. I'll call her tonight; you can go tomorrow. In the meantime, come eat dinner."

"I'm not hungry."

"I'll see you downstairs in ten minutes." He turned and left. Kathleen slammed the door behind him.

* * *

And so, by the next evening, Kathleen was back in Queens. To her shock, her mother grounded her as well, but she was too angry with Elliot and Olivia to go back to their house. She wasn't speaking to either of them, and after talking to her sister, Lizzie decided that she was mad at her stepmother as well for getting Kathleen in trouble. The whole house was divided. 

Olivia woke up around three AM to a quiet, "Mama? Mama?" beside the bed. Ben was standing there, eyes wide and clutching a teddy bear.

"What's wrong, sweetie?"

"There a monster under my bed." Olivia picked him up and put him on the bed between her and Elliot.

"Rick was playing 'Resident Evil' with you in the room again, huh?" Elliot and Rick loved the game, but Ben got nightmares every time he happened upon them playing it. The little boy snuggled down next to her without replying. "You warm enough?"

"Uh-huh. Love you, Mama." She smiled.

"At least someone does."

* * *

TBC... 

Thanks for the feedback I've received so far. I tried to take suggestions into consideration w.r.t. revising this chapter. Hope everyone had a good New Year's


	3. Chapter Three

When Elliot woke up in the morning, he nearly rolled over his son in a sleepy attempt to give his wife a kiss. "That wasn't there last night," he whispered with a grin.

"Monster under the bed," she explained.

"You should have woken me up; I would have chased it out for him."

"That's okay. I didn't mind having him here to hug for a night. All too soon he's going to be too old for this." Elliot groaned.

"Don't remind me. I've already got two through that stage." He noticed the silence. "Hey, Liv. I know things are…not fun right now, but they can't stay this way forever."

"I always thought that I was really lucky before with your kids. That they didn't blame me for the divorce or resent me for getting together with you. Hell, they set us up. But…I am just the stepmother. There's no rule that they have to get over being angry with me eventually."

"I'll make one," Elliot told her. "We are a family, Liv. Step, half, or whatever. We're still a family."

* * *

After a week, the near-silent treatment was starting to wear thin. Kathy was going up to visit her parents since her father wasn't doing too well, so Kathleen had to return home whether she liked it or not. The grounding had been lifted; she had to be home by curfew, but spent most of her time out of the house with her friends. 

Olivia had a rare day off (and a Friday, too!), and got to spend some extra time with the younger kids of the house. When Rick and Lizzie got home from school, Olivia and Ben were in the kitchen getting together ingredients to make chocolate chip cookies from scratch. Rick happily joined them – cookie dough was a favorite food of all the Stabler kids – but Lizzie hung back, preferring to be alone. Her attitude had changed in the past twenty-four hours, and unfortunately, it wasn't changing for the better.

"Is something going on with Lizzie?" Olivia asked Rick. "Other than what's been going on with everyone?" He shrugged.

"I don't know. I guess she's pissed at everyone now; she was hardly talking to me today."

"Did something happen at school?" Another shrug.

"Hey, Ben, watch this," Rick told his brother. He grabbed a bit of the cookie dough and rolled it between his hands into a near-perfect ball, which he put down on the cookie sheet that was before him. Without warning, he banged his fist over the ball, flattening it. Ben laughed hysterically, but Olivia caught his hand before he could imitate his brother with one of the other cookies on the sheet.

"You guys just love putting ideas in his head, huh?" she asked Rick. He smiled innocently.

Once the cookies were done and had been adequately sampled, the boys headed off to video-game land. Olivia cleaned up the kitchen, and then went looking for Lizzie. She was in the living room, dressed for her dance class and reading a book. "You ready to go?" Olivia asked her.

"Mrs. Rice is picking me up."

"No, she's not. I told her I was home and could take you to class. Come on."

* * *

The car ride was mostly quiet, although not for lack of trying. "You know when your recital is yet?" Olivia asked her stepdaughter. 

"No."

"Do you know when you'll find out?"

"No."

"Oh. Hopefully your mom can come back to town for it." Nothing. "Do you know what you're doing for the recital yet?"

"No." She finally gave up.

Just before they got to the rec center where Lizzie took lessons, she finally turned to her stepmother. "Olivia? What makes it okay to tell a secret?"

"I told your Dad what happened with Kathleen because I was scared that she was getting herself into trouble. Getting grounded is a whole lot better than winding up with alcohol poisoning or an overdose. Some people don't survive those."

"So…it's okay when not telling the secret might be worse than telling it?"

"Yeah, that's a pretty good rule to follow. Does that make sense to you?" Lizzie nodded.

"Yeah." They had arrived at their destination, and Olivia stopped the car. Lizzie, however, seemed reluctant to get out.

"What's the matter?"

"I've got a secret I think I should tell…but the person's going to get in a lot of trouble."

"Can you tell me who the person is?" Lizzie shook her head. "Can you tell your dad?"

"No!"

"I think you need to tell someone, though…How about you, me, and your dad sit down tonight and we can figure something out, okay?"

"Okay."

"All right, you don't want to be late to class, huh?" Lizzie shook her head.

"No. Madame gets mad if we're late."

"I'll be back to pick you up afterwards."

"Kay. Bye, Olivia."

"Bye, sweetie."

* * *

"Is Kathleen home?" Elliot asked Olivia over the phone. She'd called him at the station and told him about her conversation with Lizzie once she'd gotten home. 

"No. But I think if one of us finds her, we keep an eye on her. I'll bet a month's salary that Lizzie's secret is about her sister."

"I'll see your month and raise you two." Olivia looked up when Rick came in the room.

"Ben fell asleep playing while I was playing video games," he told his stepmother. "I put him in his bed." She frowned.

"He fell asleep?"

"Yeah, just kinda conked out all of a sudden."

"What's going on?" Elliot asked through the phone.

"Ben fell asleep."

"You didn't put him down for a nap today?"

"No, I did."

"He was all hyper," Rick reported. "He almost broke my controller."

"I need to go check on him," Olivia told Elliot. "I'll call you back about dinner."

"Okay." She hung up and followed Rick upstairs.

"Did you give him anything to eat while I was gone? More cookies or something?"

"Nope. We just played hide and seek. He's so silly; he never found me, and I was just sitting in the bathroom."

"What was he doing?"

"I don't know. I found him poking around in Kathleen's room. But don't tell her we were in there. It's the 'off-limits by punishment of death' area."

"How long was he by himself?"

"Not that long. After I couldn't hear him anymore in the hall, I went looking for him." They got up to the boys' room, and Olivia knelt by her son's bed.

"Hey, Ben, wake up, buddy. It's gonna be dinnertime soon. You can sleep after you eat…Ben?" However, he wasn't waking up. And she suddenly realized how warm he was. "How long has he had a fever?"

"Um…I don't know. I didn't know he was sick."

"No sniffles or coughing or anything?"

"No." Olivia tried one more time to wake her little boy up, but he was out cold.

"Go get my cell and call your dad," she told Rick. "Tell him to get Lizzie and meet us at the hospital."

* * *

Lizzie was packing up her bag at the end of her dance class when she saw her father come inside. "Hey, where's Olivia?" she asked him. 

"We're going to go see her now. Come on." They headed out to his car.

"Are we going to dinner?" Lizzie asked.

"No. We've got to go over to the hospital." Her face instantly turned fearful.

"Why? Is it Kathleen?"

"No, Ben."

"What happened to him?"

"We don't know."

* * *

By the time that Elliot and Lizzie got to the hospital, Rick was nervously waiting in the waiting room while Olivia stayed with Ben. "What happened?" Elliot asked his son. 

"He wouldn't wake up. I didn't know anything was wrong with him, Dad, honest." He nodded.

"I know. Where are they?" Rick pointed to one of the curtained off areas. "You guys stay here."

Olivia looked up when Elliot joined her. "Hey."

"How's he doing?"

"He's still not awake."

"Do we know what happened?"

"He and Rick were playing. He was alone in Kathleen's room for a bit. He had to have eaten or drank something in there. I don't know what she would have had in her room, though, that he could get into."

"Are they doing bloodwork?"

"Yeah. He had a temperature of a hundred and four when we got here."

"Jeez."

"How's Rick?" Olivia asked after a moment's silence.

"Okay, I think. I left him and Lizzie together."

"I know he's thinking it's his fault. I tried to tell him, but…I guess we all keep thinking that now that Ben's older, we don't have to watch him as much. He can understand that he's not supposed to eat soap or drink bottles under a sink. I don't get how this happened." Elliot brushed a stray lock of Ben's hair from his face. He'd been planning on taking both of his boys to the barber shop the next day; they were starting to look like sheepdogs. Now, he was just hoping he'd see his youngest's eyes by the next day – they could leave their hair as long as they wanted.

"Maybe he's not quite as much of a big kid as we all thought."

* * *

By the time the doctor came back, Ben was slowly waking up and Lizzie and Rick had joined them in the examining room. "May I speak to you?" the woman asked Olivia and Elliot, indicating that she meant in the hallway. Olivia reassured Ben that they would be back and managed to pull her fingers from the little boy's grasp. 

"What's going on?" Elliot asked once they were outside. "What did his bloodwork show?"

"Your wife said you had four children?" she answered his question with a question. He nodded.

"Five total. Those three, an eighteen-year-old that lives with us as well, and then a twenty-three-year-old in Connecticut."

"Is the eighteen-year-old's room where Ben was alone?"

"Yes," Olivia told her. "What's going on?"

"Your son had a cocaine overdose. For a child his age and size, it wouldn't take much."

"Is he going to be okay?"

"I want to take him now for some scans to make sure there hasn't been any brain hemorrhaging. Other than that, we'll keep him under observation for a couple days. He seems to be a very lucky boy." The doctor went in to get Ben ready. Olivia turned to Elliot in shock.

"If Rick hadn't come downstairs and told me when Ben passed out…" Elliot didn't answer, just brushed past her towards the door. "Elliot, where are you going?" His face was an absolute mask, and she was almost afraid of what he was trying to keep buried.

"To find my daughter," he tightly replied.

"El, wait…We need you here more. Your son needs you holding his hand, and I need you holding mine." He looked torn for a long moment, but finally nodded.

* * *

TBC... 


	4. Chapter Four

Elliot went with Ben to get the scans done and Olivia stayed with Rick and Lizzie. "Do you remember what Ben was doing when you found him?" she asked her stepson.

"Um…looking in Kathleen's bag, I think. I pulled him away."

"Do you know if he was holding anything?" He shook his head.

"I'm sorry, Olivia. I wasn't paying that much attention. I didn't think it was important."

"That's okay," she told him.

"Do they know what's wrong?" Lizzie asked.

"Yeah…Kathleen had drugs in her room, and Ben found them and took some."

"I didn't leave him that long!" Rick instantly said.

"I know you didn't. I believe you. He probably thought that what he found was sugar, and the fact that it didn't taste like sugar is more than likely the only thing that saved him from being a lot worse off than he is now. It's not your fault, Rick, because he should be able to go anywhere in the house without us worrying that he's going to find something we don't know about. This was not your fault, okay?" He slowly nodded.

"But it was mine," Lizzie told her, tears falling from her eyes. "I knew, Olivia. I saw her last night."

"That was your secret?" Lizzie nodded.

"I didn't want to get her in trouble! She said she wasn't going to take it, but one of her friends gave it to her and she didn't want to make them mad. I wanted to trust her; that's why I didn't know if I should tell you. I'm sorry! I didn't think Ben would get hurt. I really didn't." Lizzie was sobbing, and Olivia pulled her into her arms.

"I know you didn't. It wasn't your fault, either, okay? There was no way you could have known." Rick wrapped his arms around his sister as well, and they stayed together in the waiting room for a long time. Olivia was trying to figure out how they'd ended up in their current situation, but she couldn't put it together.

* * *

Once he got a room on the pediatrics ward, Olivia got Ben to bed while Elliot got the twins something to eat, since none of them had ever had dinner. He came back to find his wife watching their son sleep. 

"I'm going to take Rick and Lizzie home," he told her. "You going to be okay?"

"Yeah. He got to sleep fine."

"You want me to come back once they're in bed?"

"No, stay with them." Elliot approached the bed and leaned over to kiss Ben's forehead.

"Sweet dreams," he told his son. He kissed Olivia as well. "You sure you'll be all right?"

"It's not like I don't know this hospital inside out from work."

"I know, just…the last time we were here for something other than work was when Ben was born." She slowly nodded.

"Yeah, I've been thinking about that a lot…The image of you holding him for the first time keeps popping up in my mind. You said you didn't care if we had a boy or a girl, but I know you better than that, Elliot." He smiled.

"I would've gotten over it if the outcome had been different, but yeah, I'm not gonna deny that I had my hopes up. I just remember, when that doctor said he was a boy…you have no idea." Olivia smiled.

"Actually, I've got some. I don't think Ben was in as good of a mood." Elliot laughed.

"Hey, he had a set of lungs and he knew how to use them.

"That was the truth. But they put him in your arms and he just cracked one eye open and stared at you for a bit, and then he settled down." Elliot laughed.

"Yeah, he didn't like getting put down very much back then, did he?"

"No, he did not…and as he was lying here tonight, I was holding his hand, and just thinking…I used to wonder how people did it. How they lived in this world, knew all the things that were wrong with it, and still brought children into it. Your kids taught me different."

"Oh, yeah?"

"Mmm-hmm. You ever just sit and listen to a nine-year-old try and explain the world? Or hear a toddler's idea of the perfect day? They see all the things that we can't. They saw us before we could even admit it to ourselves. It's an incredible thing to be young enough not to know what can't be done. And now I finally get it."

"Get what?"

"The problem with bringing children into this world is that they eventually grow up."

* * *

When Elliot, Lizzie, and Rick got home, there were a few lights on, so they knew that Kathleen had been there, but she'd left again. After the twins were in their beds, Elliot headed for Kathleen's room. There wasn't anything else he could do for his son at that point, but there was much that needed to be done for his daughter. He wanted to know what she wasn't telling him. 

"What are you doing in my room?!?" Kathleen asked as she came in the door a scant minute before her curfew to see her father tearing it apart. He held his hand out to her.

"Where is it, Kathleen?"

"Where is what?"

"The coke; where is it?" Her eyes went wide.

"Lizzie ratted?"

"Your sister didn't have to rat on you! Your brother found it, and he's currently in the hospital."

"What was Rick doing in my room?"

"Not Rick, Kathleen. Ben. Your three-year-old brother overdosed on your cocaine, and I want to know what you did with it."

"I don't have it. Is he going to be okay?" Elliot ignored her question.

"What do you mean you don't have it?"

"I gave it back to my friend. I was holding it for him so he wouldn't get caught."

"So you don't want your friends to end up in jail, but you don't care if one of your siblings ends up dead?"

"Lizzie and Rick know better, and I didn't think Ben would be in my room!"

"It doesn't look like you've been doing much thinking at all lately."

"I didn't do it on purpose! Is he going to be okay?"

"We don't know yet." Elliot took a few breaths to calm down before an all-out yelling match started. He had no doubt that Rick and Lizzie had been patiently listening for their sister's return, but he didn't need the neighbors in their business. "What was going through your mind that made you think this would be a good idea?"

"I don't know."

"You're going to have to do better than that, Kathleen."

"I don't know, okay? I'm sorry!"

"'Sorry' doesn't cut it this time. Did you ever think about what would happen if you got caught with drugs?"

"I wasn't taking them."

"That doesn't particularly matter in the eyes of the law."

"So what happens now?" Elliot sighed.

"I don't know…I talked to your mother; we were thinking about sending you up to her."

"To Canada? Now? It's the middle of the school year! I can't just leave all my friends and everything." Elliot snorted.

"Wake up, Kathleen! These friends almost got you into more trouble than you can get yourself out of…I want a name."

"What?"

"I want the name of whoever you decided covering for was so important."

"No. I'm not getting them arrested."

"At this point it's pretty much them or you. Tell me who had the drugs, where they got them from – something! – and I'll see that you get in as little trouble as I can."

"You're negotiating with me? I'm not one of your suspects! Why aren't we allowed to screw up? Are you really that perfect?"

"There is a difference between just screwing up and almost getting someone killed."

"I wasn't trying to hurt Ben!"

"You weren't protecting him, either! And no, I'm not perfect. But family comes first."

"Family comes first? Is that why we barely saw you growing up? I would have thought that saving the rest of the world comes first."

"You think the past few years have been easy? They haven't always been, for any of us. Even with Olivia's help, it's taken a lot of creative planning to raise four kids. But we do it because we couldn't imagine anything different. And yeah, I probably should have been there more when you were little, but that was the past and I can't change it now. I thought we'd done pretty good lately. And I thought you were a hell of a lot smarter than what you're proving to me right now."

"So that's it? One strike and you're out?"

"No, Kathleen. I'm not sending you out on the street. I think you need some time with some one-on-one parenting, and there isn't a lot of that in this house. I'm trying to keep your brothers and sister safe, and you safe from yourself. And if you can't understand that now, then I just hope someday you will."

* * *

The next morning, Elliot and the twins were headed back over to the hospital after a quick breakfast of cold cereal. Kathleen wasn't leaving her room or talking to her father, and Elliot wasn't inclined to have another fight with her. He'd talked to Kathy, and had agreed to put their daughter on a flight to Canada on Monday. 

After spending the morning home alone, Kathleen finally ventured downstairs to get something to eat. The phone rang while her food was being microwaved, and Maureen's number popped up on the caller ID.

"Hello?"

"Kathleen? It's me. How are you doing?"

"Are you calling about Ben?"

"No, I'm calling about you. Dad told me last night about Ben, and I just talked to Olivia at the hospital, but I want to know how you're doing." Kathleen didn't answer. "Have you seen him yet?"

"No."

"Are you going to?"

"I don't know. I doubt anyone wants me there."

"Kathleen…you messed up. Big time. Deal with it. Luckily, Ben's going to be okay. That means you've got a chance to make up for this. And no, it's not going to be easy, but you've got to do it."

"What if I can't? I mean, Dad's sending me away. He's never made any of us leave before. What if he decides he doesn't want me back?"

"That's not going to happen. Do you know how scared Dad is for you? With all the stuff he deals with at work, do you know how scared he is that one of us is gonna wind up as a file on someone's desk? That's always been what he's afraid of. I think at one point he thought that maybe he could make the world a little safer for us, but he's learned better since then. We've got to keep ourselves safe, and you're not exactly helping out in that department."

Kathleen sighed. "So what am I supposed to do?"

"Well, for starters, you could be with the rest of your family right now instead of sitting home by yourself. Nobody's forcing you into exile, Kathleen. They just don't know how you got where you are, and how to keep it from happening again. You're scaring them."

"I don't mean to."

"I know. I guess this is just your first grown-up problem, and they weren't ready for that yet."

"Is this what happens when you go away from home? You get all wise and sage-y?" Maureen laughed.

"Kinda. You get a new perspective. I can see a lot of stuff about Mom and Dad and growing up with them differently now. And I think Dad knows it. He saw a lot of stuff about us differently after he and mom got divorced. He wants to give you the same opportunity. I think it'll help you, too."

* * *

After she finished with her sister, and got something to eat, Kathleen headed over to the hospital to find the rest of her family. A nurse directed her to Ben's room, and from the hall, she could see that Lizzie, Rick, and Ben were the only ones inside. The twins were each holding a book and reading to their brother. 

"Peter flung out his arms," and after resting the book on his lap, Rick demonstrated. "There were no children there, and it was night-time; but he addressed all who might be dreaming of the Neverland, and who were therefore nearer to him than you think; boys and girls in their nighties, and naked papooses in their baskets hung from trees. 'Do you believe?' he cried."

"Tink sat up in bed almost briskly to listen to her fate," Lizzie continued. "She fancied she heard answers in the affirmative, and then again she wasn't sure. 'What do you think?' she asked Peter."

"'If you believe,' he shouted to them, 'Clap your hands; don't let Tink die'."

"Do you believe in fairies?" Lizzie asked Ben. The little boy nodded. "Then you clap, too." And he obligingly clapped his hands.

There was something so perfect about the three of them together, and Kathleen could remember when it had been her and Lizzie and Rick that were caught up in the innocence of childhood. She hadn't asked to grow up, and wondered if she'd pulled her brother and sister along with her too soon.

"How long have you been here?" she heard a voice behind her ask, and turned to see Olivia.

"N-not that long…I'm sorry, Olivia. I didn't think…It was really stupid and I'll never do anything like it again." She was quiet for a long moment.

"Between you and me – I swear I won't tell your father – did you actually take any of the drugs yourself?"

"No."

"Have you ever before?"

"No." Olivia simply nodded.

"Why are you standing out here instead of going inside?"

"I didn't really know what to say."

"'Hello' might be a start." Kathleen turned back towards Ben's room. All three occupants looked up when they saw her in the doorway.

"Hi," she said.

"Hey," Rick cautiously replied. Ben waved as well, but Lizzie was silent.

"C-can I join you guys?"

"We're reading Ben more of Peter Pan," Rick told her. "I'm doing the parts with Peter and the lost boys, Lizzie's reading for Wendy and Tinkerbell, and Ben's pretending he's Michael."

"Sounds fun."

"W-we could use some pirates coming up," Lizzie told her. Kathleen nodded.

"Sure."


	5. Epilogue

Elliot took Kathleen to Kennedy Airport on Monday morning. For the time being, she'd be spending three weeks with her mother and grandparents, and then they'd see how things were going. Elliot knew his daughter wasn't fighting him anymore about going away, he just didn't know why.

"Your mom said she'd be waiting for you when you got there," Elliot said as they stopped by the security line to say good-bye.

"I know."

"Okay…This isn't a banishment, Kathleen, or even your punishment. It's just…" She nodded.

"I know. I've got to figure stuff out. 'Cause I guess I don't know how we got to this point any more than you do. So I'm going. But I want to come back."

"We want you back. We do." He pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket. "Olivia said to give this to you before you left."

"Thanks…Tell Lizzie and Rick that I love them and I'll miss them?"

"I will."

"And give Ben a hug for me…or whatever."

"I'll do it. He's going to miss you, too."

"You're never going to trust me with him again, though, right?"

"Never is a long time. And trust is gonna take some work all around, but it'll happen." She slowly nodded.

"Kyle Reddon." Elliot frowned. "My friend. Or, I guess he wasn't, really. But you wanted a name, so…"

"Thank you." Kathleen glanced at her watch.

"I should probably get going. Don't want to miss my flight." Elliot nodded, and pulled her into his arms.

"I love you, Kathleen," he whispered into her hair. She held him tighter.

"I love you, too, Daddy."

* * *

Once she'd gotten through security and found her gate, Kathleen pulled out the note that her father had given her. She found a seat by the window and sat down to read. 

_Lizzie asked me the other day what makes it okay to tell a secret. And we came to the general consensus that secrets shouldn't be kept if keeping them does more harm than telling them. I'm not exactly sure when or why this became a secret, but it seems like it has, and I thought I needed to share it with you: somewhere along the line, the 'step' got dropped when I think of you and your brother and sister. You're not my step-kids; you are my kids. And maybe I don't have the right to feel that way, but I do. I love you guys the same as Ben, and that's not going to change no matter how often or badly you screw up. We're going to get angry with each other, because that's what people do, but I think I've come to see that as a good thing. Because you couldn't get angry with someone if you didn't care about them. So keep everyone's love with you, have a safe trip, and we'll talk when you get home._

* * *

Ben came home from the hospital that afternoon. He wasn't quite up to a hundred percent yet, but he was doing pretty well. That evening, everyone could be found in Elliot and Olivia's room, sitting together on their bed while Lizzie and Rick finished reading/acting out Peter Pan. Lizzie and Rick volunteered to put Ben to bed after the story, giving their parents some time alone. 

"Cut it out, Stabler," Olivia told Elliot when she saw the faraway look he was getting in his eyes.

"What?"

"I know what you're thinking, and you need to cut it out. There's no such thing as Neverland, all kids unfortunately do grow up, and you can't stop them any more than you can stop them from making mistakes along the way." Elliot smirked.

"Since when are you the logical one?"

"I've always been the logical one. We'd be in trouble if you were supposed to be the logical one." He leaned over and kissed her.

"I don't know what I would do without you."

"You say that a lot, you know."

"That's because it's the truth."

"Well, I'm not planning on leaving you…I don't think." They both smiled.

"That's good to know."

"I'm only keeping you for your body, though."

"That's it?"

"Mmm, and maybe for your cooking skills. You've learned well over the years."

"Well, I had a good teacher." Elliot wrapped an arm around Olivia's shoulders, and she curled up next to him as he gently played with her hair. "So do you know what we're supposed to do now?" he asked after a long minute of silence.

"Take it one day at a time? Isn't that what you told me when we got together? Stay one day ahead of yesterday, and look forward to tomorrow." Elliot nodded.

"One day at a time."

* * *

_Finis_

Well, maybe. This isn't the REAL end (unless people think it should be). I'll get around to a third story soon, hopefully, but class starts tomorrow, so that stuff's gotta come first. Thanks to all those who are still following along and have left reviews.


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